Clues of the Heart: Baytown Boys Series

by Maryann Jordan

  “If the case is not so much about money, but about revenge…anger…maybe even betrayal, then the Reynolds’ family are high on the suspect list,” Mitch agreed. Looking over at Gareth, he asked, “You want to go with me to Berry and Associates to talk to Carrie and then over to the Reynolds’ again?”

  Grinning, Gareth said, “Just let me tell Katelyn where we’re going. Who knows? Maybe her intuitions will solve this case after all.”

  Jerry opened the door, his smile dropping as soon as his eyes landed on the visitors. “Chief Evans…Mr. Harrison.” He stepped back and allowed them entrance into the house.

  Cindy walked from the back, wiping her hands on a dish towel, her grimace in contrast to her words of welcome. “I was just fixing us some tea. Would you like some?”

  “No, thank you,” Mitch replied. “We have a few more questions for you.”

  Inclining her head toward the living room, she led the group to the chairs. Perching on the edge of her seat, she said, “How can we help you?”

  “We wanted to talk to you again about the timing of when Carrie discovered Walter was her father.”

  Eyes narrowed, she answered, “I told you…we talked to Carrie after Walter died and found out he had not changed his will.”

  “We were hoping to find Carrie here so that we could talk to her also,” Mitch prodded.

  “Why on earth would she be here on a work day?” Cindy quipped, her lips pinched.

  “We went to the accounting firm and were told that she was out sick today,” Gareth explained. “When we went to her apartment, she was not home and her car was not in her parking space.”

  “Oh…uh…well…” Cindy met Jerry’s eyes, her brow scrunched.

  Gareth observed the couple carefully and was convinced they were truly confused. “So, you don’t know where she is today?”

  “No, but she’s an adult,” Cindy snapped. “She doesn’t tell us every step she takes.”

  “We understand,” Mitch said, his voice steady. “Is it possible that she could have discovered the truth about her father before you told her?”

  Jerry’s eyes widened as Cindy reared back. “What? That’s ridiculous!”

  “But it is possible,” Gareth pressed.

  “She was completely stunned when we told her,” Cindy explained. “She didn’t act like she knew. In fact, she was angry with him, even though he was dead, and with me. Even at Jerry.”

  “But that could have been an act. It’s possible that she discovered the truth and kept quiet, pretending anger…or perhaps became truly angry, when it all came out from you? That is a possibility, right?”

  Cindy opened and closed her mouth several times but nothing came out. She looked over to Jerry, his face tight as he spoke, “Anything’s possible, Chief Evans.”

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Oh, she’s got company.

  Katelyn’s car crunched over the gravel in the driveway to Eleanor’s house and she observed another car parked out front. She hesitated, trying to decide what to do. She had planned on seeing Eleanor for coffee tomorrow but, once Gareth called to tell her where he and Mitch were going, she became antsy.

  Unable to concentrate, she tried to organize some of Gareth’s files, but found herself staring off into space instead. Finally, giving in to the restlessness clouding her mind, she decided to pay an impromptu visit to Eleanor. But now, looking at the darkening sky with the clouds covering the sun, she wondered when the predicted storm would hit. The forecast called for tropical storm winds and heavy rain lasting into the next day. She hoped to visit today since tomorrow would be an indoor only day.

  Now, parked behind another car in the narrow driveway, bordered by trees, she wondered if she should interrupt. I’ll just pop in and say hello. She probably has lots of friends just drop by.

  Walking to the front door, she raised her hand to ring the doorbell when she noticed the front door was not quite closed all the way. Ringing the bell, she waited but Eleanor did not answer. Pushing on the door slightly, she stuck her head inside.

  “Hello? Eleanor? It’s Katelyn.” No reply. “Eleanor?” she raised her voice, but still no reply came. Debating between her nosiness and what was socially acceptable, she opened the front door slightly wider and stepped inside. Calling out once more, silence was all that greeted her. Unsure if she should continue or back out, she cocked her head to the side, listening for a clue of someone present.

  A faint sound of voices could be heard and she took another step into the house. Shaking her head in derision, knowing she had been taught to never enter someone’s home uninvited, she nonetheless continued toward the kitchen. Rounding the corner, she ascertained the voices were coming from the back porch. A few boxes were stacked in the hall, permanent marker labels on the outside. Men’s clothes. Men’s shoes. CDs. Books. Katelyn remembered Eleanor had said she was going through some of Walter’s things.

  A golf bag was propped next to the boxes with a pair of golf shoes on top. A few extra golf clubs were also piled next to the bag. Still hearing the sounds from the patio, she wondered, Should I go back out the front and walk around?

  Her breeding overcame her curiosity as she turned to back out of the kitchen quietly and head toward the front door. A tote bag, partially opened, on the kitchen counter, pushed almost out of sight, caught her attention. Blonde hair protruded from the opening. Thick, sandy, blonde hair. As if drawn by an invisible magnet, she stepped over to the tote and lifted the material. Inside was a wig, haphazardly stuffed into the large bag. Licking her lips, Katelyn glanced behind her, still hearing the voices from the backyard.

  Peering deeper into the bag, she pulled out a lipstick…cheap, drugstore brand. Popping off the cap, the bubblegum pink color was exposed. Sucking in a quick breath, she realized whoever was here talking to Eleanor may have been the woman with Walter at the hotels. The edge of a wallet was peeking out from underneath the wig. With another glance behind her to check the sliding glass doors leading to the patio, she reached inside to pull it out. Red leather. Expensive. Opening it, she glanced at the driver’s license, and gasped.

  The bay bridge stretched out in front of them, white-caped waves crashing against the pylons.

  “It’s a good thing we’re getting back before the storm hits,” Mitch said, expertly handling the police SUV in the high winds sweeping over the road. “If it gets stronger, they’ll shut down the bridge.”

  “That happen much?” Gareth asked. “I’ve never been out here in a hurricane before.”

  “Not too much, but it does happen. We don’t always get a direct hit from a hurricane, but often get the remnants of ones that come up the coast. When that happens, they’ll close off the bridge and we hunker down. Right now, this is just predicted to be a tropical storm.”

  “What about flooding?”

  Mitch nodded. “Had a flood back in 2014.”

  The two fell into silence as they went down into one of the tunnels, the SUV getting slapped with the strong winds when they emerged. As Mitch continued the drive toward the Eastern Shore, Gareth stared out the window, his mind not on the impending storm outside, but on the uneasy feeling in his gut that the case was about to erupt.

  Stepping closer to the sliding glass door, staying in the shadow of the kitchen, Katelyn leaned as far as she dared to peek outside. Eleanor was sitting in a patio chair, the floral pattern of the cushion in stark contrast to her black pants and blouse. Shifting slightly, Katelyn spied Carrie sitting in a similar chair facing Eleanor. Two half-filled glasses of iced tea sat on a table between them. Panic caused her heart to pound as she tried to think what to do.

  Slipping her hand into the pocket of her raincoat, she felt for her phone while stepping backward so her words would not be heard. Pressing the shortcut for 9-1-1, she halted as she backed into a wall, dropping the phone back into her pocket.

  Whirling around, she startled as hands reached out to grab her arms. The wall turned out to be a man. Glaring at her he growled, “W
hat the hell are you doing here?”

  Katelyn stared, dumbstruck, at Ken as his grip tightened. The pain in her arms provided the opening for anger to overtake her surprise. Kicking out, her boot hit its target and he immediately let her go, dropping to grab his shin as he cursed.

  Whirling, she ran toward the door but the sound of gunfire behind her and the splintering of wood next to her halted her flight. Turning around, she stared at the gun in his hand. Directly behind him, the sliding glass door opened as a wide-eyed Eleanor looked on.

  “What…” Eleanor began, her surprised expression morphing into anger.

  “Caught her in here snooping.”

  Katelyn glanced behind the couple, observing Carrie still sitting in the patio chair, not moving. Narrowing her eyes, she bit out, “What have you done to her?”

  Shooting a look over her shoulder, Eleanor turned back and said, “She’s just having a little rest…for now.”

  Ken, his eyes still on Katelyn, said to Eleanor, “We don’t have time for this. We’ve got to keep on schedule.”

  Reaching over, Eleanor took the gun from his hand, and ordered, “Get the duct tape from the top kitchen drawer. Tape her wrists together and then you can get going. We’re still on schedule.”

  “What are you doing, Eleanor?” Katelyn pleaded. “This makes no sense. You…why you…why did you kill your husband?”

  As Eleanor stepped closer, Katelyn watched as her face contorted with anger. “He betrayed me. What we were. What he promised.”

  Not understanding, Katelyn’s gaze dropped from Eleanor’s eyes to the gun in her hand, fighting to stay brave when her knees began to quake. A slight shake of her head indicated she still had no idea what Eleanor was talking about.

  Ken came back into the room, a roll of grey duct tape in his hand. “Hold out your arms,” he ordered. Katelyn complied, secretly glad he was taping her hands in front of her and not behind her back. She placed one wrist slightly over the other, a small separation between them, which she hoped he would not notice.

  “Was it for the money? The inheritance?” she asked, lifting her eyes back to Eleanor.

  “He promised me that I was his only love…that there’d be no one else that he loved more than me.” Snorting, she continued, “He had no idea that I’ve taken birth control during our entire marriage. I never wanted kids and had no plans to share him with anyone else.” Her eyes seemed to be pleading with Katelyn for understanding as she repeated, “And he promised me that I was his only love.”

  Biting her bottom lip as Ken wrapped and then ripped the tape, she continued to maintain the space between her wrists, giving them a bit of wiggle room. He walked away, tossing the roll of tape on the counter. Turning to Eleanor, he jerked his head toward Katelyn and said, “What about her? What the hell are we going to do about her?”

  “I still don’t understand, Eleanor,” Katelyn said, hoping to keep them talking. She looked over Eleanor’s shoulder at Carrie still sitting in the patio chair. The winds had increased and, by the look of the clouds, it would soon be raining. She could not tell if Carrie was dead or just knocked out.

  Eleanor noted where Katelyn’s attention was and, as though she knew the unasked question, she replied, “She’s not dead…yet. She’s only drugged.”

  Her gaze shooting back to Eleanor’s face, she asked again, “But why?”

  Eleanor’s chin quivered as she answered, “Walter and I were happy. Just the two of us. He said he would always take care of me. We had our wills made out and everything would come to me. Then I found out he had a daughter. A daughter! He kept that from me. He didn’t tell me he set her up with a job. And then he started paying for her college. When would it stop? I knew he was falling for her…glad to be a father after always telling me he was fine with it just being the two of us. He didn’t want me to work, so I’ve always counted on him to take care of me. And now with her?” she jerked her head toward Carrie, “I’d be stuck with her sucking away the money for the rest of my life.”

  “So, you killed Walter? That’s your reason for killing your husband?”

  A flash of uncertainty flew through Eleanor’s narrowed gaze as she bit her lip, looking toward Ken. “I…I…”

  “Shut up!” Ken said, drawing Katelyn’s attention.

  Wondering if he were the instigator, rather than Eleanor, she said to him, “Then again, with Walter out of the way, you knew you were taken care of…especially with your mother still living.”

  Ken glared at her before shifting his gaze to Eleanor. “You told me this would be easy money. You told me that if Walter’s daughter got an inheritance, I’d get nothing.”

  “Of course, that’s true!” Eleanor bit back. “And I took care of you, didn’t I?”

  Understanding began to dawn on Katelyn as she listened to their conversation. Still unable to tell exactly who had planned Walter’s murder, it was evident they had played on each other’s insecurities. Working her wrists, she inched backward, but had no clue how to extract herself from their clutches.

  Suddenly, Eleanor shouted, “Enough!” Looking at Katelyn, she said, “You’re a problem, my dear, that I didn’t want to have to deal with. But now we have no choice.” Turning to Ken, she ordered, “Put her in the trunk.”

  Eyes wide, Katelyn felt a sigh of relief escape her lips as he walked to open the sliding glass door and headed toward Carrie. Eleanor stepped over to a kitchen chair, where she picked up a raincoat and slid her arms inside. Picking up the blonde wig, cut in a similar fashion to Carrie’s, it dawned on Katelyn that Eleanor was dressing as Carrie.

  “What’s your plan?”

  Eleanor’s lips curved into a smile as she said, “Why, Carrie will be driving home, where she will park her car in her garage for any neighbor to see and then, when the garage door is down, she’ll leave the car running.”

  “And you’ll be the Carrie that they see. Then you’ll slip out and no one will be the wiser. It’ll look like a suicide.”

  “Now you’re getting the idea.”

  “But a toxicology report will show the drugs you gave her in the tea. That’s how you drugged her, isn’t it?”

  Another flash of uncertainty filled Eleanor’s eyes before she straightened and replied, “It won’t matter. Nothing will point her back to here. I asked her over under the pretense of getting to know my husband’s daughter but told her, due to the lawsuit, she shouldn’t tell anyone she was here.”

  Her mind racing over the past month, Katelyn’s gaze dropped to the tote bag still on the counter. “The wig…you were the one at the hotel? You…”

  Nodding, Eleanor’s smile slid back into place. “This took planning, my dear. Ken and I made trips to a flea-bag hotel with no security. It was easy to charge it to Walter’s account and make it look like one of the women he works with was having an affair with him.”

  “And Beth?”

  Lifting her shoulders delicately as though Katelyn had mentioned something unpleasant, she added, “She called to say she wanted to meet. Said she’d found a discrepancy in the office accounts. I was suspicious and had Ken meet me at the location I chose.” Lips pinched, she spat, “Stupid woman! She thought to blackmail me. Me!”

  “So, you killed her and brought her back here?” Katelyn asked, incredulity filling her voice. “Why on earth would you do that?”

  Throwing her head back in a cackle, Eleanor said, “It’s perfect! Who would suspect me? It was obvious the body was brought here from somewhere else, so why would the police suspect me? After all, it was me who called them and then cried about someone trying to frighten me.” She stepped closer to Katelyn, her face now sad, and added, “Don’t you see? I had to. He lied to me…he told me it would always just be me…just the two of us.”

  “But Eleanor, he didn’t lie to you. He didn’t know he had a daughter.”

  “He gave her a job…he met with her mother. The next thing you know, he would have wanted to have her over for dinner…birthdays, Christmas. And then,
then…I know he would have wanted to do something more permanent. He would have changed his will…leave what he could to her. She,” jerking her head toward the patio where Ken was in the process of lifting the unconscious Carrie over his shoulder before walking around the side of the house, “would have always come between us.” Shaking her head sadly, she whispered, “Always…”

  Katelyn, her body quaking, stared as she realized the woman standing in front of her had slipped into an alternate reality…hell, she’s fucking crazy!

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Just as Mitch and Gareth turned off the highway toward Baytown, Mildred came across the police radio.

  “North Hampton called. A 9-1-1 call came in, but the caller did not speak. The operator could hear a partial conversation in the background. The phone was traced to Katelyn MacFarlane.”

  “Shit!” Gareth cursed, pulling his cell phone from his pocket. Having silenced it, he checked his messages. “She was going to Eleanor’s.” Looking toward Mitch, he said, “Whoever killed Walter may have come back for Eleanor!”

  “Ten-seventeen. Eleanor Berry’s home. 142 East Beach Cove Road. Ten-thirty-three. Alert NHSD.” Making a u-turn on the uncrowded street, Mitch immediately pressed the accelerator, hurrying to the scene.

  “I thought she was going to see Eleanor tomorrow,” Gareth said, fear gripping his heart.

  “Maybe she went early because of the storm,” Mitch offered, his lips tight as he barked more orders into his radio. “Colt and his sheriffs will meet us there. Mildred’ll send Grant and Ginny as well.”

  “At least we know it can’t be Cindy or Jerry since we just left them,” Gareth growled, as his mind worked through the suspects. “But Carrie? Fuckin’ hell! Katelyn was right!”

  “Got her into the trunk of her car.”

  Katelyn grimaced as Ken came back into the house, his nervous gaze shifting all around. He looked over at her before turning to Eleanor.